Can buses and bikes safely use the same reserved lane?

Andy Riga, GAZETTE TRANSPORTATION REPORTER07.10.2014

Cyclists ride on the cycling path on Maisonneuve Park next to Viau St. in Montreal. The STM is building a new reserved bus lane on Viau St. between Rosemont Blvd. and Pierre-de-Coubertin Ave. and will allow cyclists to also use the reserved lane.

MONTREAL — You might say Montreal’s transit agency is building a bike path next to a bike path.

The Société de transport de Montréal is touting a planned 1.8-kilometre reserved lane on Viau St. as a bold pilot project that will test cohabitation between city buses, taxis and bikes.

But few cyclists use the chosen section of Viau. That may be in part because there’s a two-way bike path in Maisonneuve Park, parallel to Viau. The paved path is about 30 meters from where the southbound reserved lane will go.

It’s unclear how many cyclists will actually use the new bus/taxi/bike rush-hour lane, which is to run between Rosemont Blvd. and Pierre-de-Coubertin Ave., beginning in late August.

In addition to the dearth of bikes, Viau, unlike some busier reserved lanes, will be mainly used by only one bus route (136), with a small section also used by the less-frequent 34 and 125 routes.

The lack of bikes and buses raises questions about the usefulness of any data gathered during the pilot project.

Though happy the long-discussed reserved lane will finally open, the head of Vélo Québec said Viau was not the ideal place to demonstrate how lane-sharing can work.

“I think they chose Viau because it has few cyclists,” Suzanne Lareau said. “I would have preferred (much-busier) René-Lévesque Blvd. There’s enough room there for buses and bikes to coexist.”

She said she does not think the existing path in the park will deter cyclists from taking the reserved lane. The park path ends at Sherbrooke. “If you’re continuing south, you won’t enter the park to take that path,” Lareau said.

Vélo Québec hopes the pilot project will eventually lead to cyclists being allowed in all reserved lanes.

The STM has a plan to criss-cross Montreal with reserved lanes. If cyclists remain barred from them, the proliferation of such lanes will close off too much of the road network to cyclists, she said.

However, it may be difficult to use what is learned on Viau elsewhere in Montreal.

The public tender document for the Viau project indicates the new lane will be unlike other STM reserved lanes.

It will be 4.5-meters wide. By comparison, the bus-taxi reserved lane that recently opened on Sherbrooke St. in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce is only 3.2 meters.

Under the Viau plan, bikes will not actually be in the same space as buses and taxis. Lines will be painted near the sidewalk to indicate a corridor bikes must use, STM spokesperson Isabelle Tremblay said.

Viau was chosen for the pilot project because the street had been selected to get a bus lane and the city wanted to expand northward a bike path that now runs from Notre Dame to Sherbrooke Sts., Tremblay said.

She said Viau was also chosen because its width and traffic patterns meant the cost of adding the reserved lane would be relatively low.

An estimate for the Viau project was not available but Tremblay said STM reserved lanes cost at least $100,000 per kilometre.

That means the section of the Viau lane that will welcome bikes — 1.8 kilometres in each direction — will cost at least $360,000. Transport Quebec will pay the bill.

In the past, STM bus drivers have resisted the idea of sharing reserved lanes with cyclists, citing safety concerns. Bus drivers will not be given any special training before the Viau lane opens.

McGill University transport researcher Ahmed El-Geneidy has also said combined bus-bike lanes are a mistake, noting buses have big blind spots that make them dangerous for cyclists.

But Lareau said many other jurisdictions, including Quebec City, Chicago and Paris, have long allowed bikes and buses to share reserved lanes. Paris has 200 kilometres of such lanes, she said.

Cyclists should be reminded to follow certain rules when in bus traffic — the main one being not to cycle next to a bus, Lareau said. Instead, cyclists should stay behind or in front of buses, she said.

At the moment, Montreal cyclists risk a ticket if they use lanes where signs indicate that only buses are allowed.

But the Montreal police traffic division last year told The Gazette cyclists are rarely ticketed for the infraction because Quebec’s Highway Safety Code is ambiguous.

Reserved lanes are typically on the right-hand side of the road. One section of the Highway Code says cyclists must ride on the extreme right side of a road, while another says cyclists must comply with all traffic signs.

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